The 2008 United States presidential election in Tennessee was held on November 4, 2008, and was part of the 2008 United States presidential election. Voters chose 11 representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
Republican John McCain defeated Democrat Barack Obama in the state by 15 percentage points. Prior to the election, 17 news organizations had correctly predicted that McCain would easily carry the state, and virtually all polling indicated the same. Most news organizations called Tennessee for McCain immediately after the polls closed. McCain slightly improved upon George W. Bush's performance in 2004, despite the nation as a whole trending significantly Democratic in 2008. This was the first time since 1960 that Tennessee did not back the overall winning candidate in a presidential election. Furthermore, this was the first time it voted differently from swing state Ohio since 1944, and the first time it voted Republican while that state voted Democratic.
McCain became the first Republican to ever carry historically-Democratic Stewart County. As of 2024, this remains the last time that Houston County and Jackson County have voted for a Democratic presidential nominee or that the party has received more than 40% of the vote. It was one of five states to swing Republican from 2004, along with West Virginia, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.
Primary elections
Democratic primary
The 2008 Tennessee Democratic presidential primary took place on Super Tuesday, February 5, 2008. Hillary Clinton won with 53.8% of the vote and was awarded 40 delegates. Barack Obama placed second, getting 40.5% of the vote and was awarded 28 delegates.
Republican primary
The 2008 Tennessee Republican presidential primary took place on Super Tuesday, February 5, 2008. Mike Huckabee narrowly defeated John McCain to win the largest share of Tennessee's delegates to the 2008 Republican National Convention. Both McCain and the third-place candidate Mitt Romney received delegates along with Huckabee.
* Candidate dropped out of the race before the primary
Results
Predictions
There were 16 news organizations who made state-by-state predictions of the election. Here are their last predictions before election day:
Polling
McCain won every single pre-election poll, and each by a double-digit margin of victory. The final 3 polls averaged McCain leading 55% to 40%.
Fundraising
John McCain raised a total of $2,941,065 in the state. Barack Obama raised $3,481,341.
Advertising and visits
Obama spent $518,659. The Republican ticket spent just $3,526. Obama visited the state once, going to Nashville. McCain visited the state twice, visiting Nashville and Blountville.
Results
By county
- Benton (largest municipality: Camden)
- Clay (largest municipality: Celina)
- Grundy (largest municipality: Altamont)
- Humphreys (largest municipality: Waverly)
- Lake (largest municipality: Tiptonville)
- Lauderdale (largest municipality: Ripley)
- Overton (largest municipality: Livingston)
- Perry (largest municipality: Linden)
- Smith (largest municipality: Carthage)
- Stewart (largest municipality: Dover)
- Trousdale (largest municipality: Hartsville)
- Van Buren (largest municipality: Spencer)
By congressional district
John McCain swept the state and carried seven of the state's nine congressional districts, including three districts held by Democrats. Barack Obama carried the state's two congressional districts anchored by the two largest cities of Memphis and Nashville.
Electors
Technically the voters of Tennessee cast their ballots for electors: representatives to the Electoral College. Tennessee is allocated 11 electors because it has 9 congressional districts and 2 senators. All candidates who appear on the ballot or qualify to receive write-in votes must submit a list of 11 electors, who pledge to vote for their candidate and his or her running mate. Whoever wins the majority of votes in the state is awarded all 11 electoral votes. Their chosen electors then vote for president and vice president. Although electors are pledged to their candidate and running mate, they are not obligated to vote for them. An elector who votes for someone other than his or her candidate is known as a faithless elector.
The electors of each state and the District of Columbia met on December 15, 2008, to cast their votes for president and vice president. The Electoral College itself never meets as one body. Instead the electors from each state and the District of Columbia met in their respective capitols.
The following were the members of the Electoral College from the state. All 11 were pledged to John McCain and Sarah Palin:
- Sara Sellers
- Jim Haslam
- Wayne Cropp
- Lisa Wheeler
- Beth Campbell
- Albert McCall
- Shirley Curry
- Marilucile Counce
- Colin Richmond
- Winfield Dunn
- Chrystal Horn
Analysis
Despite narrowly voting for Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996 when former Tennessee Senator Al Gore was on the ticket as Vice President, the state, along with neighboring Arkansas has steadily been trending Republican since then. George W. Bush narrowly carried the state in 2000 over Gore and easily won in 2004 over John Kerry.
A handful of Tennessean counties—including those that hadn't voted Republican since landslide victors Reagan or Nixon were on the ballot, swung dramatically Republican. For example, Grundy County, in southeastern Tennessee, broke 56%-42% for John Kerry in 2004, but wound up being swept by McCain 55%-42% this year. The state was one of five states that swung even more Republican in 2008 with John McCain soundly defeating Barack Obama in Tennessee. 2008 marked the first time since 1960 whereby the state was carried by the losing presidential candidate. A possible factor to Tennessee ironically swinging rightward—despite the national Democratic trend—could be the state favoring Hillary Clinton, former First Lady of neighboring Arkansas, over Barack Obama in the Democratic primary, as was the case in Arkansas itself.
McCain won both East Tennessee and Middle Tennessee by landslide margins. Historically, East Tennessee, which is a part of Appalachia, is one of the few ancestrally Republican areas of the South. Most of its residents strongly opposed secession during the Civil War. They identified with the GOP after the return of peace and have remained in the Republican fold through good times and bad ever since. Some of the region's counties are among the few in the country to have never supported a Democrat for president.
However, Middle Tennessee has Democratic roots based on liberal economic policies, most famously Franklin D. Roosevelt's Tennessee Valley Authority. Middle Tennessee voted strongly for Bill Clinton of neighboring Arkansas, but Middle Tennessee native Al Gore narrowly lost the region in 2000—a loss that ultimately cost him Tennessee, and the election. In contrast, it was one of the few regions in the country which voted more Republican than in 2004. This is largely due to a growing social conservative trend in the region, particularly in the Nashville suburbs; some of the most politically active churches in the state are located there.
On the other hand, Barack Obama did improve relatively well upon John Kerry's performances in the traditionally Democratic cities of Nashville and Memphis. In the former, support amongst progressive whites led to a 3–2 victory for Obama in Davidson County. In Memphis, heavy African American turnout ensured him the largest margin in the state in Shelby County, although far from enough to outweigh his losses everywhere else in the state. McCain carried Hamilton County and Knox County, home to Chattanooga and Knoxville, the two largest cities in East Tennessee.
During the same election, at the state level, Republicans picked up four seats in the Tennessee House of Representatives and three seats in the Tennessee Senate to obtain control of both chambers of the state legislature for the first time since Reconstruction.